Business-Driven Product Management

Business-Driven Product Management

Ateala Management Inc.September 2009

© Ateala Management Inc. 2009. All rights reserved.

OverviewBusiness-Driven Product Management is about managing products to meet long-term business

and revenue objectives.

The challenge, as companies grow, is to balance …Market Expansion,Customer Satisfaction, andTechnology Innovation

… while meeting business objectives, with fixed resources.


The Balancing Act The need to balance Market Expansion, Customer Satisfaction

and Technology Innovation is vital … Scales tipped too far along one axis will cause problems in any of the

other axes Many companies are wed to their technology and focus on making it better They listen too much to their customers and end up missing where the

market is going

Each puts stress on the product - potentially resulting in the implementation of features that do not necessarily help in meeting overall corporate goals … Lower than expected new account acquisition Dropping customer satisfaction levels Technology deficit / inability to innovate


Market ExpansionExpanding further in current markets and/or moving

into new markets is vital forGaining additional revenueAdding new-name accountsIncreasing market-shareMomentum; securing more customers has a positive domino

effect

Potential product gaps may be exposed that need to be filled to meet market objectives

Table-stakes requirements (i.e. those that must be their to enter)

Competitive pressuresDefine/reinforce unique value proposition


Customer SatisfactionVibrant, enthusiastic customers want to see the

product improve and have many requests … to support their immediate needs

Passionate, vocal, enthusiastic of the product – participate in every forum, user group … great reference!

Demanding – consistently voicing their opinion over what they need and/or want

Meeting these requests requires caution ...Product can become highly customized for a single, very

vocal customer; leading to future upgrade issuesCustomer can direct you into a market or solve problems that

may not necessarily be a good fit; leading to future support issues


Technology Innovation Infrastructure products and technology matures and

changes over time Keeping current with third party infrastructure and tools

reduces the support costs and maintains maintainability Leveraging newer technologies needs to align with customers

infrastructure and meets their needs and is not a collection of buzzwords

Innovating the product to maintain / enhance differentiation may require leveraging of new technology, e.g. … Client/Server -> Web technology On-Premise offering -> Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offering Partnering with a platform/infrastructure


Opinion vs. FactMany opinionated discussions take place instead of fact-

based discussions to make product investment decisions Sales vs. Marketing vs. Customer Support vs. Development

Without a proper methodology at an operational level it is a challenge to decide what requests need to be satisfied Predictability of meeting corporate goals will not be consistent Scarce development, test and documentation resources may not

be consistently allocated to requests that support the corporate goals and objectives

Opinionated discussions usually result in the most vocal as the “winner” – which may not be best for the business


Business ObjectivesCentral to Business-Driven Product Management is

the methodical evaluation of requests against business objectives

Business objectives need to be … Aligned with the corporate goals and objectives

Well-defined traceability from corporate level to operational level is vital to ensure corporate-level objectives are met

Defined at an operational level Review process must be able to answer the question “how well

does this request satisfy/meet this objective?” Few in number and well-articulated

More than 5 objectives and/or fuzzily stated objectives will not yield meaningful results


Methodology1. Define business objectives

• Derived from corporate goals and objectives• No more than 5 well articulated objectives• Must each be at the operational level

2. Weight each objective to reflect their relative importance in meeting corporate goals and objectives

3. Assess each request against each objective• Assign a numerical value to how well the request meets the

objective• Use a scale where 0 means that the request does not meet

the objective and an upper value (e.g. 5) that fully meets the objective

4. Use resulting list to drive product development plans• Top-most request meets the business objectives the best


Benefits1. Companies become focused on doing what the business needs to do to

succeed• Most customers cannot articulate this and therefore do not express their

wishes in these terms

2. Products and product releases will contain features and capabilities that are aligned with corporate goals and objectives, as well as company initiatives• Sales barriers will be reduced

• Marketing / lead generation activities will be supported

3. Critical development resources will be focused on building what matters to the company• Extra-curricular development activates will be significantly reduced

• No project ending surprises

4. Teams will be more harmoniously aligned• Collaboration amongst stakeholders will improve

• Teams will be more productive


Ateala Management Inc.Ateala Management is a provider of product

management and product marketing consulting, training and coaching services to start-up, small, medium and large hi-technology companies. Our focus is on helping companies implement a business-

driven product management methodology to improve their top-line revenue, improve productivity, increase customer satisfaction and increase their market-share

For more information on Ateala Management … Web: www.ateala.com Tel: 613.836.6750 Cell: 613.797.8579 Email: [email protected]


http://www.ateala.com/

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Business-Driven Product Management

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